Kris Attfield is the author of three books: The Book of Finch, Letters to Whomever, The Eagle's Sore: A Novella and Pfhonge, The Inter-Continental Brink of Madness, Air Defence, Doorless Darts and Blaine Bananatree - a bunch of video games.

Friday, November 17, 2017

Being Shamed by South Park

I just watched the most recent South Park Episode on a subscription I have through iTunes.

For the sake of Fair Use, but to not infringe on any copyright --- I will say this much about this episode and how it compares to myself, in a sort of shameful way. I'm just going to stress my partial synopsis of this episode is fair use in that I'm only talking about a portion of the show, as well as I'm adding my own commentary to depict a comparison with my own life. I'm pretty sure that falls under fair use.

In this episode, we learn Heidi is the best science student in the school, and it's her job to judge the special ed science fair. At this time, Cartman is a bad influence on Heidi, and she doesn't want to be at school on a weekend.

Yes ---- I relate to this, and I do feel like I'm being "shamed" by this episode, whether it's directly about me or not.

I compare to this in two ways:::

When I was in school, I was a really great student. I was smart and got really good grades.

However, I eventually ended up intentionally trying to get away from school as much as possible in the end. Part of it was, of course, mental illness ---- but there was a very real factor in my personality where I'd much rather sit around playing video games than do boring school stuff. Maybe a part of the problem was some bad school experiences I once had::: in elementary school, I was all for extra-curricular activity, but after a junior high experience of other kids trying to hypnotise me to do very bad things, by High School I was just happy to be with my video games.

On a side note: video games are actually good for you. Just thought I'd mention that. More or less good for you.

There's another way I compare too, and this is where the shame comes in:::

Plan Canada has sent me communications where they tell me that I am one of their most loyal supporters and that my name has power.

That's why they sent me a form to fill out a while back where I would offer some moral support to the charity to try to help end discrimination against women.

I agreed that girls should be educated, that mothers and women should receive health care and I am generally not interested in violence against them --- so I filled out the form like I was signing a petition.

I think sometime in the past week Plan was holding an online event they invited me to where they would update us on the actual issues facing women they work with in those countries.

Though I agree more or less with what Plan Canada wanted - to end discrimination against women -- I was kind of like Heidi in this episode in that I had absolutely zero desire to sit through an online webcast on this topic, and in fact I didn't even keep track of when it was going to happen. I just let it slide.

Yes --- it feels like this episode is shaming me for something that happened in recent time frame.

I'm not promising that I'm not going to be lazy and be a bit more proactive ----

I will say the big reason I'm able to be a "loyal" supporter of Plan Canada is because I have an assured income and I budget well ---- there is minimal threat to my ability to give support.

I'm just not paid very much, and there's not a whole lot more I can do for or with Plan Canada.

Maybe I'm supposed to be famous or something ----- but I get paid less than minimum wage. I can't just go anywhere like my patriarchal blessing said I would, not without money.

So, I can provide very limited support to any charity ----- but though I'm almost expert at some things I do ------ I like my free time, essentially.

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On a side note ---- it's just so strange how I often end up comparing myself and my own life to all kinds of 'texts' ---- it is getting weird.

That's why I'm thankful for the movie "Murder on the Orient Express" --- a movie which I haven't yet seen, but wanted to, which looks more relatable to my brother-in-law rather than myself. Hah. :)